History
The earliest recorded sighting of the Loch Ness Monster was in the biography of St. Columbia by Adamnan in the year 565 AD. The monster apparently attacked and killed a man who was swimming in the River Ness.
The monster didn't make headlines again until August 27, 1930 when 3 fishermen reported seeing a disturbance in the water. The men watched as a creature 20 feet long approached their boat throwing water in the air. As it passed them, its wake caused their boat to rock violently.
The men were convinced that the disturbance was caused by a living creature. Following the story, the newspaper received several letters from people claiming also to have seen a strange creature in the Loch.
In 1962 The Loch Ness Investigation Bureau was formed to act as a research organization and clearing house for information about the creature. In the beginning it only conducted research for a few weeks in the year, but by 1964 they established a more permanent presence around the Loch. Eventually the Bureau established camera stations with both still and cinema cameras with telephoto lenses. They had vans which served as mobile camera stations, and underwater listening devices. Searches were conducted using hot-air-balloons and infrared night time cameras, sonar scanners and submarines.
A great deal of information was discovered about the Loch, but they have yet to produce any concrete evidence of a monster.
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For many years it has been reported that there is a large dinosaur-like "monster" residing in Loch Ness. The evidence for its existence are a series of sightings of a plesiosaur-like dinosaur throughout the last 100 years. The case has occasionally been supported by indistinct photographic evidence.
However, several scientific studies have been conducted, including thorough sonar surveys of the loch, and these have not revealed any presence of such a "monster". Many people believe that the size (21 square miles) and great depth of the loch (almost 800 feet), together with potential underwater caves, gives the monster many places to hide.
Most of the Nessie witnesses describe something with two humps, a tail, and a snakelike head. A V-shaped was often mentioned, as well as a "gaping red mouth" and horns or antennae on the top of the creature's head. Nessie's movements have been studied, and the films and photos analyzed to determine what Nessie might be, if she exists.
There are numerous theories as to Nessie's identity, including a snake-like primitive whale known as a zeuglodon, a type of long-necked aquatic seal, giant eels, walruses, floating mats of plants, giant mollusks, otters, a "paraphysical" entity, mirages, and diving birds, but many lake monster researchers seem to favor the plesiosaur theory.
Most scientists believe that these marine reptiles have been extinct for 60-70 million years, but others think it possible that after the last Ice Age the Loch may have been connected to the sea, and some of these dinosaurs may have been stranded. Others feel that lake monsters could not possibly be plesiosaurs since plesiosaurs were cold-blooded reptiles that would have preferred warm oceanic currents to cold Scottish Lochs.